Tag Archives: Houston Public Media

Music Musings

Encore!! Houston Classical Music Gains Dedicated Radio Coverage

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Recent years have proven challenging for Houston’s incredible Arts Scene.  After KUHF’s Award-Winning program The Front Row closed its doors in 2013, the city’s diverse collection of artists and musicians lost one of their greatest champions.  In the years since, Houstonians have been wondering what will become of the once robust local music and arts coverage that was offered on public radio.

Past live performance from KUHF’s The Front Row featuring members of the Houston Ebony Music Society, 2012.  Performers are DuWayne Davis, Adavion Wayne, Wayne Ashley and Leon Turner with Dr. John Cornelius at the piano.  

Even with excellent intermittent feature stories from the great folks at Houston Public Media’s Houston Matters and the dedicated work of Arts and Culture reporter Amy Bishop and TV8 program Arts InSight, Houston Arts have dearly missed the programming options and connectivity that our former program schedule provided, and have been left wondering if there will ever be additional options.

Luckily with 2017, part of that open question is getting answered, as Houston Public Media premieres a new program dedicated to classical music in the area.  Here’s more from Clifford Pugh of CultureMap…

Fans of Houston’s classical music scene will have a new outlet as Houston Public Media debuts a new weekly radio show and podcast that highlights performances of local concert organizations. Encore Houston premieres Saturday at 10 pm, with an encore performance Sunday at 4 pm on Classical 88.7 HD-2 and online at houstonpublicmedia.org/listen-live.

The first episode features Mercury‘s performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, also known as the “Choral” Symphony, from May 2016, along with commentary and details about the chamber orchestra’s upcoming performance from Houston Public Media classical host and producer Joshua Zinn.

[…]

Other classical groups that will be featured during the first season are KINETIC, Chamber Music Houston, DaCamera, Ars Lyrica, Houston Early Music, Context, Musiqa, Bach Society, Houston Chamber Choir, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, and St. Cecilia Chamber Music Society. The length of each show varies according to the concert performance; most shows will run between one and two hours.

Like other HPM program offerings, each episode of Encore Houston is also available via podcast, so if you’ve missed the debut, you can always go back and check out the previous shows.  Beyond listening, you can also show your support for Encore Houston (and any possibilities of future arts coverage) by posting about the program on social media.  Host and producer Joshua Zinn is on Twitter as @HPMZinn, and though there’s no Facebook page for the specific show yet, you can always like the Houston Public Media page and like/comment on posts about the new show.

After a noticeable drought of music and arts coverage, it’s great to see those resources slowly reforming in the community.  Encore, indeed!

Houston, Houston Politics, Texas Politics

Big Oil Sues To Weaken Houston Pollution Regulators

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In an era where many of the nation’s richest cities have forged their wealth in big banks and stock market trading, Houston has maintained its standing as an industrial town.  A large part of the metropolitan economy centers around production and shipping.  One third of America’s plastics, and one fourth of all gasoline production is done in or very near the city limits.

With all of that heavy industry comes the burden of heavy pollution.  Its no surprise that practically every night’s newscast features a major chemical spill, localized air quality alert or concerns from a community trying to discover the truth of a recent pollution event.  These realities are a fact of life for residents of Southeast Texas.

It’s also why Houston works so hard to protect its residents from such hazards.  The City of Houston’s Bureau of Pollution Control and Prevention (BPCP) has an extraordinary task of maintaining balance between the region’s economic growth and environmental safety.  The roots of the Houston BPCP go back to the 1960s.

But some Big Oil companies want to weaken the BPCP’s abilities to protect Houstonians.  Here’s the story from Dave Fehling of Houston Public Media…

In a case scheduled to be heard later this year before the Texas Supreme Court, a group of big energy companies will argue that the City of Houston is breaking Texas law.

The big companies – which include ExxonMobil and Conoco Phillips – say only the state can legally enforce Texas environmental laws. Lawyers for the industry did not make themselves available for an interview. But in briefs filed with the court, they argue that Houston is going rogue, enforcing state pollution laws because: “Houston disagrees with the TCEQ’s enforcement actions.”  TCEQ is the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

It’s no secret that Houston and Harris County officials have for years complained that the TCEQ isn’t nearly aggressive enough in monitoring plants and pursuing polluters. In briefs submitted by environmental groups, they call the TCEQ “severely underfunded” and say that’s why it’s critical the city help out by having its own pollution police.

Which, according to the city’s pollution control bureau, is exactly what the state’s TCEQ has been asking Houston to do for years.

“We receive complaints from TCEQ weekly, “said Daisy James, acting chief of the Houston Pollution Bureau. “We used to have a contract with TCEQ.”

Even with the TCEQ often in cooperation with the local agency, some Big Oil companies have chosen to try and snatch local control away from the city, even if it means exposing Houstonians to more dangerous pollutants.  Keep in mind that the lawsuit isn’t actually about whether the companies themselves are violating state regulations, but rather who catches them in the act.  They know that state monitors, by nature are both less capable of being a local watchdog and less familiar with the violations in place.

This is a story that needs more awareness across the state.  Houston residents deserve to have the best environmental protections available to them.  Not to be bullied by companies that don’t want to meet the highest standards in the first place.

It’s time for Big Oil to clean up its act.  Then they won’t have to worry about who’s watching.

houston plants

(photo credit:  wikipedia)

Houston Politics

Texas Senate Debate… Democrats included

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Something quite unexpected and welcome occurred during last night’s Texas Senate debate. Titled “Conversation with the Candidates” it was produced and Co-Sponsored by Houston Public Media and the Texas Tribune.

For the first time since 2006, the state of Texas had a major political debate in which both Democrats and Republicans were present. Sure the Democrats were outnumbered 4 to 2, but at least both viewpoints were there and were voiced. This was a huge “win” for Texas Democrats even if one of their candidates doesn’t win the seat.

Now you may be thinking “2006? That can’t possibly be true. We had a Gubernatorial election in 2010… Rick Perry vs. Bill White.” Bill White and Rick Perry only participated in Primary debates, but there was never a debate in the General Election. Had Perry debated White, we may have been spared the abysmal performances he gave us in the 2012 Primary Election cycle. You know what they say… Practice makes perfect, right?

As divided as those viewpoints were at times, last night’s debate was quite respectful among the candidates. The presumed GOP front-runner David Dewhurst spent most of his time attacking The President saying that real economic improvement couldn’t occur until we “send Barack Obama back to Chicago, get a good, conservative Republican in the White House that will follow a stable, predictable course.”

Dewhurst also spent much of his time touting his accomplishments along side Rick Perry. Though, it’s fair to say that Texas is no longer under a surplus and education and health care costs for our state continue to surge out of control. He apparently thought it was a record worth sharing.

Ted Cruz spent most of the evening going after Dewhurst for harsh campaign ads, and name-dropping all of the Washington insight he’s built up as an Attrorney arguing before the Supreme Court. Not a whole host of solutions.

It was clear from the debate that former NFL-player Craig James had no prior political experiences. Between living off of mayo sandwiches, fear of “hurting our lizards” during natural gas fracking, and his invaluable life lessons on the goat ranch, his other pie-in-the-sky answers left this viewer non-plussed. He calls for lowering corporate tax rates to 0 percent, and then somehow jobs and business will simply flood our shores. He’s not ready for Prime Time yet.

Among the GOP contenders, the most capable candidate to handle real problems of everyday Texans was former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert. Even if you don’t agree with his positions, you have to respect him for presenting logical solutions to our state and our nation’s issues. He presented his views with a clarity and poise that wasn’t present in the other Republican candidates. That’s not an endorsement… just a recognition.

The best surprise of the debate was a 31 year-old Dallas business owner named Sean Hubbard. A clear, unapologetic Liberal who stands up for his values, but also presented the logic skills that are so desperately needed in Washington right now. When asked about the future possibility of drought in Texas, he say that “We should be investing now in Deselination plants.” A solution that no other candidate (and most in our state government) have even considered. Though mostly in agreement with his Democratic opponent Paul Sadler, Hubbard maintained a more concise, prominent and straight-forward presence among the group. When discussing Women’s Rights, Hubbard said that it’s “an embarrassment” and stated that “women are more than capable of making their own decisions about their bodies and their health.” He even revealed that for a time his wife used the services of Planned Parenthood “not for abortions, but for cancer screenings”.

After two long hours, my endorsement would have to go to Sean Hubbard for his clarity of thought, innovative solutions and strength of viewpoint. The Honorable Mention would go to Tom Leppert, because even if I didn’t agree with his positions, the willingness to search for real solutions instead of just saying no.

Here’s a link to the full debate. Watch for yourself and form your own opinion.